A Baltimore decide has overturned the conviction of Adnan Syed, experiences . The 41-year-old had been serving a life sentence for the 1999 homicide of his former girlfriend Hae Min Lee. In 2014, his case attracted worldwide curiosity after it was chronicled by former Baltimore Solar reporter Sarah Koenig within the first season of the hit podcast Serial.

Koenig spent greater than a 12 months investigating the specifics of Syed’s case, focusing specifically on the conduct of his lawyer, Cristina Gutierrez. In 2019, Maryland’s highest courtroom discovered Gutierrez had didn’t correctly examine an alibi witness however voted towards granting Syed’s request for a retrial. Nonetheless, prosecutors lately advisable {that a} decide grant him a brand new trial, noting the state had misplaced “confidence within the integrity of the conviction.” With Monday’s resolution, the state has 30 days to resolve whether or not to maneuver ahead with a brand new trial or drop the case totally.

“This isn’t a podcast for me,” , the brother of Hae Min Lee, throughout Monday’s listening to. He mentioned his household felt “betrayed” and “blindsided” by the state’s movement to vacate Syed’s conviction. “At any time when I feel it is over, and it’s ended, it all the time comes again,” he added.

Following the choice, Serial introduced it will air a brand new episode on Tuesday morning. Within the years since its broadly profitable first season, Serial has produced a collection of spinoffs, together with and . Extra broadly, it’s secure to say the true crime style and podcasting extra typically have by no means been extra in style – even when the collection was by no means fairly in a position to replicate the success of its first season.